This invention concerns a gauze counting apparatus for surgical use, by means of which quantitative control of the gauzes used during a surgical procedure or operation can be easily and safely carried out.
Control of the gauzes used in the field of surgery is currently done manually by one or more people. For example, the instruments operator may be responsible for counting the gauzes received before the start of the operation and of those that are left unused at the end of that operation. Another person, for example the field nurse, counts the gauzes used in the course of the operation. By means of this system, the number of gauzes used is controlled.
This system assumes that the checking carried out is not the responsibility of the surgeon, who is the one who is actually in charge of the surgical operation or procedure.
Moreover, the control of the gauzes that is done at the end of the operation forces the procedure to come to a halt and, in the best of cases when the result of the count is correct, requires a certain amount of time to be devoted, between 5 and 10 minutes. In the event of the count obtained being incorrect, a circumstance that happens fairly frequently, checking and confirmation have to be carried out again, which can last a much greater length of time. In extreme cases, it will be necessary to check whether any gauze has not been controlled and whether it has even left behind in the operating zone.
A further problem presented by the manual control system discussed above is the possibility of human error in the different counts, so that the counts are given as correct even when they are not. Forgetting an intra-abdominal gauze could have extremely serious consequences, including the death of the patient.
These problems reveal the medical-legal repercussions which correct control of the gauzes used during a surgical procedure can have.